Sexist Bill Maher on sexism

We’re two of those poor HBO-less saps who have to wait until the following Wednesday to get the free podcast of the previous Friday night’s episode of “Real Time with Bill Maher.” And so we only just discovered his final “New Rule” from last week: “Republicans have to stop thinking up intricate, psychological explanations for why liberals don’t like Sarah Palin or Michele Bachmann. Let me save you all some time. Are you ready? Because they’re crazy people.” Now, Bill Maher is not exactly what we’d call a feminist icon, and he’s pretty selective about which sexism he shuns — he’s definitely not down with the systemic misogyny of religions like Islam which allow women to be stoned for exposing an ankle and which consider rape not a crime but a punishment, but he loves to talk about stereotypical dumb blondes with big tits and nagging sexless ball-and-chain wives. It’s tough, because otherwise his political views are very compelling. So when he delivers a smart, spot-on New Rule like last week’s — in which he explains how Palin and Bachmann aren’t dumb because they have boobs but because they are boobs, and how inherently sexist the Bible is — we can forgive him the pig that he his.